The Debate Video Thread

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I got this idea earlier and thinking about it, it'd be something fun and refreshing - bit of a departure from the usual forum shenanigans . Here's how it goes - find a debate on any video sharing site and either youtube link or post the thread links to it. It'll be interesting because if you can manage you'll at least get not only both sides of an argument represented in a medium outside of us but also I'd imagine it'll be good for bringing around a lot of names that people either are familiar with, aren't familiar with, vaguely familiar with, and people will get to hear a bit of what they have to say. I know that at least on youtube that a lot of these are chopped into 10 minute sessions due to their guidelines - no worries, you can either post the first in series or post all 6, 7, or however many.

Anyway, I grabbed this one earlier and one of the upsides is that both on youtube and all in one piece. The only downside is I have to admit off the top its not much of an even match - ie. Stephanie Miller vs. Dennis Prager, he's debated far brighter on the left and prefers to whenever possible but I'm kinda stuck with what's available for now. Keep in mind that this debate occurred in early October of 2008, so the presidential elections still hadn't been decided.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UBSTdSyQS4[/youtube]


Anyway, if you can find any good debates either conservative vs. liberal, theist vs. atheist, one philosopher vs. another - far preferably in an actual debate forum - please feel free to post links and offer what you've got.

Here's another that I had the chance to listen to today. Its clipped into 15 parts so yes, absolutely, I'm posting part I and the rest can be followed sequentially - if you have any interest.

Daniel Dennett vs. Dinesh D' Souza @ Tufts University

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iw7J15TeDG4[/youtube]

To give a quick synopsis of the overall: both had very good points. Disadvantages for Dennett: seemed to have showed up with very poor preparation, wasted his first portion of the debate on very superficial angles, and when D Souza brought much tougher issues to the table he really wasn't able to recover until later in the debate (which is unfortunate, especially as he seemed to have found his quotes in the D Souza's books but never did the research to see what D Souza was going to bring up apparently). D Souza's disadvantages: Had a few bad analogies to back up good points, that and HE TALKED LIKE BILLY MAYS THROUGH MOST OF THE DEBATE!!.

Overall though, extremely insightful discussion from both sides - Dennett more on the side of discussing memes as the source of religion and D Souza describing it as religion being sourced in very well thought-out philosophy on the human condition.

I thought this was going to be like competitive debating, where you have to argue your side whether you truly agree with our not.

I just edited the title. Hopefully that will help.

D'Souza, Hitchens, and Prager
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWqb6QOPCAI[/youtube]

Synopsis - Hitchens through a lot of anthropology at Prager and D Souza which they weren't ready to handle (similar to the D Souza & Dennett situation), Hitchens was able to disect and push himself away from totalitarian atheist killings but also following that same rule would have to add that he isn't putting accountability on the faithful for the acts of the radical. They were stumped as far as answering some of his questions but at the same time toward the end he had similar issues.

The overall idea I get of Hitchens is that his biggest problem is more with organized religion rather than general deism. Both Prager and D Souza seem to take their faiths far more philosophically than literally on the hard breaks that a lot of people see which turn them off, which he'd likely accuse them of apologism.

Where this kind of leads me - I tend to think the overall idea for theism being reached is that its abstract, that no one dogma is fully correct, and that the mutual-exclusive behavior of many religions in the past is missing the point in a lot of ways. I agree with Hitchen's in the last question given from the audience that higher altruism even stems from in a way desire to feel better about ourselves but still, a lot of his theories seem to be pinned in the idea that its all inherent biology - which is kind of the dividing line.

Christopher Hitchens v. Peter Hitchens
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmnVQLOd9Lg[/youtube]

I really don't know... Chris brings up his usual points, Peter swats quite a few down; makes me wonder how Prager and D Souza didn't have him dismantled by the end of the first round just on the semantic garble. Never seen Peter Hitchens in a debate so far, that was kind of interesting, otherwise it seems like a WWE fight that really ended up with 'Buy my books!" or "Read my articles!"; kicks and punches were telegraphed *badly* .

By the way - no worries guys, I'll be more than happy to keep this thread going even if I talk to myself and post all of the content for the remainder of it.

Its at least a good watch for anyone willing to, at minimum, hit a play button.

Full Version: Hitchens and Boteach Debate on God
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnMYL8sF7bQ[/youtube]

Different perspective, from Rabbi Shmuley Boteach this time.

Theist Vs Atheist Debate: "Does God Not Exist?" (3 parts)

Hassanain Rajabali [Muslim] and Dan Barker [Atheist]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlaEPERULhc[/youtube]